I am mid-DIY project, so I haven’t baked much this week. Instead, I am attempting to strip the ugly red paint from my new ottoman, and give it a nice cushion. Unfortunately, the paint stripping part is proving to be rather time consuming. The problem? I took the directions too seriously. Note to self: plastic does not strip paint worth a darn. After wasting a great deal of paint stripper, I realized that I had to switch to the dreaded metal tools which the paint stripping directions expressly forbade.

I assume the makers of the paint stripper were trying to protect me from damaging my precious wood. Unfortunately, the silly little plastic thing I bought from Lowe’s was useless. So, sure, I might damage the wood with a wood scraper or brush, but that’s a moot point if I can’t get the red paint off.

More on that later.

In the meantime, I offer pictures of an adorable kitty. Because who doesn’t like cats?

Featured here is Peaches. She really wanted to help me with my candied ginger from last week. Or at least, she wanted to help me eat it. Peaches was strangely absent for the actual work portion of the evening.

“No, no, I couldn’t possibly eat anything. . “

“Oh, well if you insist. . .”

Peaches thought she was a great fan of Candied Ginger. No, she was not allowed to have any.

There’s that point in the lifetime of a nice scented candle when its burnt so low that its either impossible to light with a normal match, or just not worth lighting.

But it still smells good! It still has wax! It would be a shame to just throw it out. Why not recycle? Make a new candle?

This is a really easy craft project. First you’ll need to gather together all your mostly-burned-but-not-quite candles. Organize them by what scents you think will go together, and pick out your new candle holders. Just about anything glass or ceramic will do!

Pick out a saucepan large enough to comfortably hold one or several of your candles. If your candles are loose wax and not still stuck to the bottom of glass containers, you’ll need a container to melt them in. Half way fill the saucepan with water, and put it on the stove on medium heat. Place your candles to melt in the warming water.

While the wax is melting, get some wicks ready. I think you can buy wicks for making candles, but I happened to have some craft twine already. I dipped it in wax, and then cut it into the lengths I wanted.

Anchor your wicks to the bottom of your would-be new candle holders with wax. Hold them up by wrapping them around a pencil or knife.

As your wax melts, pour it into your waiting holders-with-wicks. Leave some room at the top, and plenty of wick. You can cut the wick to the right length later.

Once your wax has cooled, its likely that it will not be flat on the top. Save some wax to fill in any gaps!